My last day in London was not the marathon of the first day and not quite the lazy day as the second, but a great middle ground. Woke up around ten, but decided to chill for a bit before heading out around 2. We went on the tube to the Holburn station to wait on one of Frank’s friends, but he never got the email. However, in our 30ish minute wait, I got to do a lot of people watching, which is always a plus. The tube is very much like the metro, where you’ll find people in business suits getting on as their means of transportation to work. The suits were dressed very smartly, although I expected to see more skinny ties than I did. One of the more humorous moments while watching was when these two guys in tracksuit bottoms and sweatshirts walked by. A smartly dressed business woman passed then, and homeboy number 1 did a double take. “Would you look at the bum on that one?” he says to his compatriot. Homeboy number 2 then turns and they both take in the view. I don’t know, part of me feels like I should have been offended for that woman, being so shamelessly ogled when all she did was put on clothes that fit nicely to her body. Part of me is also like:
but that’s only because I’ve been known to be caught CODing (boys may know this as Call of Duty, but some of the ladies of my hall second year, K2L, will probably recall this as “Creepin’ On Dudes.” Sorry I’m not sorry) many a time. But yeah, after a while we made our way to Covent Garden, which is an area with lots of shops and markets and such. We walked into all the overpriced stores and I pretended like I was looking to buy that 70 pound tank top (not a chance) or those 135 pound shoes (seriously?? That’s like more than half of my rent. How does one explain such a purchase? ‘Yeah, sorry mom and dad. I just really wanted these mediocre high-tops from the lamest Nike store on the planet. My bad.’ RUBBISH). We then got some lunch (a really great chicken sandwich…but given on a slab of wood. A plate would have sufficed, but whatever).
After lunch we walked around in circles for a bit until we got to the National Portrait Gallery. I’m a bio major, and I love it and science and all that stuff, but I have such a weakness and appreciation for great art. It was easily one of my favorite things I’ve done in a while. It was a tour of portraits from like the 16th century until today. All the kings, queens, royals and nobles, artists of all kinds, scientists, scholars, whatever you can think of all sat for portraits to be done. England and the UK have such a rich history that so much can be revealed even just by looking at pictures. The first floor went from the 16th century to the 19th century. Not many of these people were lookers though. I mean, I guess the standards of beauty have changed quite a bit, but still….Henry Brougham is the only one that I saw and went ‘okay, he was probs mad popular with the maidens during his youth. and maybe Edward Carpenter:
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| this is the image from the gallery. He could have been a silver fox. |
The exhibit that I really enjoyed was the one showing Honoré Daumier’s political cartoons. He made is opposition to anti-militarism very apparent, but in a clever tongue-in-cheek way, targeting some of the biggest pacificists of his era. So great. When I got down to the more contemporary art from the last 60 to 70 years (lots of royal portraits…Queen Elizabeth was such a doll…and Prince Phillip was a fox), there was all this commotion downstairs. Turns out that the year 12 students from the famous Brit school (some famous alumae are Amy Winehouse, the goddess of my heart and ears Adele, Neil from Inbetweeners, Imogen Heap, Kate Nash and Leona Lewis) were having some sort of showcase, playing instruments, reciting poetry, and singing. They were seriously talented. Totes would have tried to recruit some of the girls for Belles if I had more of a spine to walk up to them afterwards. Afterwards I went to try my hand at a free portrait drawing session. I was awful, but it was really fun just sitting and trying to make something out of nothing with my piece of chalk and charcoal. Finally I made it all the way down to the really contemporary stuff. It was so awesome. Except for the large mural of the nudist beach that some artist won an award for. I mean it was great, but nobody asked for that. At least, I didn’t plan on seeing naked old people anytime soon, even if it’s an oil painting. But it was so great all in all. I wish I had that kind of talent for visual art.
After some great Lebanese food (who knew chickpeas would be made into so many different delicious dishes?), we called it an early night, since I have to get up at 4 to catch the train to the airport. But London, you’ve served me well. See you in a month!
*this song is dedicated to London. but let it be known that I am team Selena all the way.
Cheers, et A Lyon!
Abena
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